


U Got It Bad

by Rave



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Celebrity, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-02
Updated: 2015-08-03
Packaged: 2017-12-16 20:25:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/866260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rave/pseuds/Rave
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time he saw Liam, Liam was upside-down with the bright Pacific spread behind him. Zayn would wonder later if that explained it a little bit: if the strangeness of the image, maybe, the unexpected postcard beauty of it, was what had made him fall so dizzyingly fast.</p><p>Liam probably would have knocked him out anyway, though. Like, realistically, just by being the person he was. Liam would always have knocked him right out.</p><p>(Zayn's an R&B solo artist in a friends-with-benefits relaysh with Frank Ocean. Liam's a straight-edge punk rocker who gives talks at colleges and is very earnest about stuff. It's weird that they would be friends, but it turns out maybe they are.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Look, basically this is sensual r&b crooner Zayn Songz and beautiful social justice punk Liam Rollins. With Eminiallem, Loutrick Tomlinstump, and Harry Clark aka St. Agatha. That's it, that's the whole concept. I hope you're into that. 
> 
> I was gonna post it for WIP amnesty, but I don't really think we're in an amnesty situation anymore. There's like 14,000 more words of this. I'm pretty sure it'll be a whole thing. Thx 2 Brenna Rubdown aka makesomelove, who screamed about this with me all day every day because she is a gemstone and a divine muse. 
> 
> you can find me on tumblr [here!](http://sashayed.tumblr.com) it's fun over there, we have fun.

The first time Zayn saw him, Liam was upside-down: balanced on his hands, eyes closed, the bright Pacific spread behind him. He’d wonder later if that explained it a little bit. If the strangeness of the image, maybe, the unexpected postcard beauty of it, was what had made him fall so dizzyingly fast. 

Liam probably would have knocked him out anyway, though. Like, realistically, just by being the person he was. Liam always would have knocked him right out.

*

It happened because Zayn had been thinking maybe meditation would be good for him. Things had been a little crazy. He’d been trying to find a place where he could learn, but it was hard to go to a regular class. It always turned into like, a whole thing with whispering or dead silence and people having to forcefully pretend they didn’t know who he was. It was just really stressful and he always felt like he was ruining the class for everybody. Plus he was terrible at doing it by himself, and Frank wouldn’t do it with him anymore because he was too jittery.

(“I can feel you thinking about cigarettes,” Frank would yell from across the room without opening his eyes, his shoulders still relaxed, his spine still straight. “Your fuckin aura smells like cigarettes. Get out, man, you make this shit impossible.”)

It was Frank who’d turned him onto this woman. She called herself a “mindfulness coach” (“Dude, ew, no,” Zayn had complained), and gave small, private yoga and meditation sessions at her house on Escondido Beach. She specialized in recognizable people, Frank had told him, people who got looked at too much.

“You’re sure she’s not a hooker?” Zayn said.

Frank laughed. “I mean I guess in some sense. Like a spiritual hooker. You pay her to learn how to rub your own spiritual dick.” He stretched, rolling his shoulders back and rumpling the sheets. 

It always surprised Zayn how small Frank’s bedroom was. As soon as _Up All Night_ went platinum, Zayn had bought a house in the Palisades the size of a whole neighborhood -- but Frank still lived here. There were framed posters on the wall and dusty venetian blinds and a keyboard on a stand in the corner: it was almost like a really nice college dorm, except that there were a couple of Grammys under the desk and Zayn could smell the sea through the big bay window. “But she’s good, bro, I got a lot out of it. Her card’s in that kitchen drawer somewhere, with the delivery menus.”

Zayn wanted a glass of water anyway so he went to get it, padding naked into the kitchen. The tiles were cool on his feet. He caught a glimpse of himself in the sliding door in Frank’s kitchen. He’d been working out a lot lately, his arms were okay, but he still had those sharp bony shoulders, the narrow chest. He felt as skinny as a kid.

“I have no ass,” he said gloomily, setting the glass and the card down on the nightstand by his wallet and dropping back onto Frank’s bed.

“Yeah you do,” Frank said. He yawned, gathered Zayn against him with one arm. “It’s cute, it’s like a little mosquito bite.”

“Dude,” Zayn said reproachfully.

“Just cause it’s not showy doesn’t mean it don’t exist. It’s like an underground artist, your ass. Only gets written up on the really good blogs. Did you get me water too?”

“Screw you, man,” Zayn said. He kissed Frank, who was laughing, so the kiss was mostly teeth.

“It’s all right, kid,” Frank said against his upper lip. “I like your concave ass.” Zayn bit his chin. Then Frank wound an arm around his shoulder and they just kissed for a while, lazy and slow.

*

It was funny, the thing with Frank. They were really close, they were both good-looking, they had great sex whenever they were both single, it would’ve made perfect sense for them to be -- whatever -- but they just. Weren’t.

(“It’s a fuckin mystery,” Frank would say tightly, passing him the joint and then exhaling.)

For Zayn it was a little more complicated. He’d known Frank before, had had a huge crush on him actually, just like every other queer kid in the industry. Whereas Frank hadn’t known him until they worked together on “Never Done Wrong,” and he still seemed just amused by Zayn most of the time. Zayn suspected that basically it was a weird older brother thing.

“It’s like he keeps having sex with me to keep me from making dumb mistakes with someone else,” he complained to Niall.

“Bless him then,” Niall said fervently. “ _I_ don’t want to do it.”

*

“Ahh, man, no, it’s not like that,” Frank had said, when Zayn brought it up with him once. Then, after a thoughtful pause, “It might be kind of like that.”

*

The meditation lady’s house was nice – split-level, right on the beach. There were wind chimes in front of the door, dinging softly together in the sea-fresh wind. Zayn shifted a little after he rang the doorbell, going to jam his hands into his pockets before he remembered he was wearing Frank’s weird yoga pants and they didn’t have pockets. It was like being a kid, going to voice lessons at his neighbor’s house for the first time. When he heard the click of the inside lock he straightened automatically, nervously.

“You’re Zayn? I’m Angie. Come on in.” He’d been expecting some kind of leathery new age hippie, someone who’d be like _My soul greets you, fellow traveler,_ or whatever, and then weirdly kiss him on the mouth or something. But she seemed normal -- a couple of extra piercings, a nice no-bullshit smile. Friendly surfer’s lines around her eyes and mouth. 

“Hope the drive wasn’t too bad,” she said as she moved back inside, holding the door for him. 

“This early it was pretty easy. I’ve had worse.” 

“That’s not saying much on the PCH.” Inside it smelled like sandalwood and incense, spicy but not cloying. “Done this before? Meditation, I mean?”

He shrugged uncomfortably. “I tried a couple times. It never stuck.”

She laughed, reached back to stretch one shoulder, and Zayn saw the flash of silver rings on her fingers. “I’ve heard that before. Let me get you a glass of water, we’ll wait for our next couple arrivals and get going. This is the meditation room. You can leave your shoes here.” She slid open a wooden door while Zayn unlaced his sneakers, and when he looked up she was smiling reassuringly at him.

“It’s okay,” she told him. 

Zayn padded in. The room felt as open as a glass bowl, wide and clean, with a tatami floor dotted with flat pillows. Through the window that made up most of the far wall Zayn could see the beach, the foamy lip of the sea, the vast, light-blue Pacific morning. 

And there against the window, his body edged gold with sunlight, a guy was standing on his hands. Like it wasn’t even an effort. 

It was like a picture in a dream, like a slow film pan, taking him in. An intricate sleeve wreathing one taut-muscled arm to the shoulder and up one side of his neck, a banner scrolling across his back that read _Resist Psychic Death!_ , the slice of tanned hip where his black tank top had fallen toward his chest: the strong graceful curve of his spine and the dusty soles of his bare feet. His eyes were closed, lips parted in concentration.

Then he glanced sideways from beneath his arm, hearing Zayn come in, and thumped -- carefully, ungracefully -- back down to a crouch. He smiled as he rose, pulling his shirt down and wiping his big hands on his shorts. He looked familiar, in a distant sort of way, and Zayn wondered for a second if they’d maybe been neighbors growing up or something. 

“Hey,” the guy was saying, sticking a hand out. There were more tattoos: four strong blackwork chevrons on his other arm, something Zayn couldn’t make out -- sun rays, maybe? -- peeking over his collarbone from beneath the undershirt. “Liam. Sorry I was upside-down.” 

Zayn felt a smile startle onto his mouth. “Zayn. It’s all right, you could’ve stayed. Didn’t mean to disturb you.” 

“I can’t shake hands from a handstand. I’m not that good.” His grip was firm and cool, and he had the clearest, most open face Zayn had seen in a long time. Soft brown eyes that crinkled comfortably at the corners, a slope-tipped nose that looked like it might have been broken once. Square jaw. A warm, broad smile.

Oh, goddammit. This was exactly the kind of thing he shouldn’t be doing right now. Exactly the reason he needed to meditate in the first place.

“Nice to meet you,” Liam was saying. “Do I know you from somewhere?”

“I was just thinking,” Zayn said, and then it hit him. “Oh, you’re -- you’re Liam Payne, aren’t you? You’re in Black Jack. I -- I saw you guys at Virgin Fest, back in October.”

The grin widened. “That’s right! Virgin Fest. I knew I knew you.” He poked Zayn’s chest gently, like Zayn had been trying to trick him but he’d figured it out anyway. “And _you’re_ Zayn Malik. You were at the Pavillion a couple acts after us.”

“That was a weird line-up,” Zayn said, and then wondered if that was an awkward thing to say. “You guys killed it, though.” He tried to remember, and could only think of someone -- it must have been Liam -- bent at the front of the stage, mic gripped too tight, yelling about _what the fuck are we spending our money on?_ He’d seemed genuinely dangerous then, hulking and inked, head shaved close, sinews wired out in the stage lights. Up close he was only a little taller than Zayn, even if he had about five times as many muscles. 

It was a bad combination, that face with that body. It made Zayn think of, like, guys who only existed in catalogs or life insurance commercials. Guys who owned big dogs and knew how to fix stuff. Sitcom fireman boyfriends.

“Nah,” Liam said easily. “I was a pain in the ass that day, I was feeling self-righteous. But I stayed to watch you. Zayn Malik -- of course. I love your shit, man, I can’t believe I didn’t recognize you.” Zayn wished he would stop smiling like that, warm and familiar, like they were already friends. “It’s like seeing your teacher in the supermarket, I guess. Different contexts.”

“Me too,” Zayn said stupidly, “I mean not -- I mean, I love you guys, I love your stuff too, ” and then, lowering his voice automatically, “Are you allowed to say ‘shit’ in here?” What the fuck was coming out of his mouth? A heated flush swooped down from his ears to his neck.

Liam laughed, but like he was kind of delighted, not like he thought Zayn was a moron. “Yeah, why not? Profanity’s spiritually freeing sometimes.” His eyes squinched up into half-moons when he laughed.

“Spiritually freeing?” Angie said, climbing back in through the sliding door. 

“Yeah, it lets off steam,” Liam said to her. When he turned his head, Zayn could see he had a mole or a freckle on his throat: chocolate-colored, unbearably cute, right at his collarbone. It wasn’t something you’d notice from the audience at a concert, or across the room at somebody’s release party.

“So you’ve met Liam,” Angie said to Zayn. There were a couple of girls behind her, and Zayn thought maybe he’d seen one of them on TV or something. She was pretty. He tried to focus on her.

“Zayn and me go way back,” Liam said, and his glance at Zayn was private, humorous, conspiratorial. He brushed the back of Zayn’s arm with his knuckles. That was all.

*

“How was it?” Frank asked him that night.

Zayn cradled the phone under his chin, studying the inside of his fridge. Marta had been there to clean today, and she’d organized everything so all the healthy stuff was in the front. He pushed it aside, hunting for the Thai leftovers he knew he’d been saving. “It was okay. That hot girl from the zombie show was there. The one who made out with the guy while she was cutting his arm off? Did you watch that with me?”

A huffed-out laugh. “I mean how was it for you? Like, the actual meditation part.” 

“Oh,” Zayn said. It had been all right, really. He’d liked Angie, and he had felt calmer after. But it’d fucked him up, having Liam there. It was impossible to stay focused. Zayn couldn’t help staring at the guy, at his broad bare shoulders, his mouth. Liam had caught him looking once, while Angie was telling them to picture a golden egg at the bottom of a well or something. The corner of his lips had quirked up: he’d winked at Zayn, pulled a little face, then schooled his features again into Zen-monk calm. 

“It was okay,” Zayn said.

“Are you gonna go back?” 

“I dunno. It might just -- I might just not be able to, like, focus for that long. It might just not be for me.” He found the takeout box, shoved behind a still-sealed package of baby spinach, and tugged it out. 

There was a question in the background, and Frank said, voice away from the mouthpiece, “It’s Zayn.” Then, “Cartier says hey.”

So that was happening again. Good. Frank was always happier when he was with Willy; maybe this time it would take. “Tell him hi back,” Zayn said, hoping Frank could hear his suggestive eyebrow waggle through the phone.

“Shut up, man,” Frank said, but fondly.

*

Zayn took his pad thai and a beer into the bedroom, unfolded his laptop and sat cross-legged on the bed. Rolo wandered in after him, thumped her fat little body onto the low mattress, sniffing for shrimp. “Get lost,” Zayn said, shooing her with his chopsticks. 

It was easy to find Liam Payne on Youtube, of course. He paged through a couple of Black Jack performances, skipping when the camera got too shaky. He wasn’t really into this kind of music -- he could respect it, but he wouldn’t exactly listen to it for fun, the drums driving too fast, the melody yelled more than sung. Still he could tell Liam had a good voice, even pretty sometimes, clear and strong for moments in the middle of the verses.

Then there was a close-up -- the strong brows drawn together, the plush mouth open, the little birthmark at the tenderest part of the throat -- right there, in the Recommended Videos. Apparently Liam gave a lot of talks, like at colleges and stuff. Zayn clicked through without even thinking about it.

Standing behind those podiums Liam Payne wore thick glasses, button-down shirts. His tattoos still showed, climbing his throat, winding out of his sleeves. Zayn shoveled cold noodles into his mouth, went through a couple of beers, watched Liam’s cheeks flush and his voice strengthen. He didn’t seem to use his notes much. He was really smart, Zayn realized, and was embarrassed for himself, for how little he knew about anything Liam was talking about -- the prison-industrial complex, stuff like that. When people asked questions he didn’t like, snide stuff, Liam’s mouth would tighten. _Due respect, man, that’s fucking stupid,_ he said to one kid, adjusting his glasses lower on his nose, glaring over the top of his notes. _That’s like, you’ve only ever seen water, so you decide ice is something people made up to complain about. You wanna tell people in Siberia there’s no such thing as ice? Do your fucking, excuse me, but really, do your homework before you talk to me like that. Or to anyone._ NECKBEARD @ MY SCHOOL GETS COLLECTED BY LIAM PAYNE was the title of the video.

Zayn balanced his last empty on the bedside, started to type _Liam Payne shirtless_ , and then, for some reason, stopped. It was one thing to have seen Liam half-naked balanced on the edge of the stage at Virgin Fest, but it was different to pore over rows of Google Images like a bunch of pinned bugs. Somehow it felt -- it was so embarrassing -- but it felt like a jinx. Like if he did that, there was no chance he’d ever see it in real life. 

Not that there was any chance anyway. Not that -- well, whatever.

He closed the computer. Rolo was nipping down a last piece of cold egg from the styrofoam he’d left balanced on the pillow. When she saw Zayn watching her, she fixed him with a disdainful eye and lifted one fuzzy paw, yawning before settling in to clean up. 

*

He didn’t see Liam Payne again for a couple of weeks, and when he did it came out of nowhere. He hadn’t scheduled another session with Angie. He’d thought about it, but it had just seemed -- stressful. Which was the opposite of the reason he’d been thinking about meditation in the first place, so. 

Anyway, there was so much going on. He’d be back in the studio in August and there were only like eight, nine songs even in workable condition, then plus the hook for Niall’s demo. He’d thought that one at least was fine, but Niall was freaking out about it again. 

“I’ve got to get this thing together in like a week,” Niall said. His accent always got stronger when he was stressed. _Dis ting._ “Told you I cut the whole verse about me mum, right, so I was thinking, maybe we could do another couple of takes, you could do ‘shaped me’ instead of ‘raised me,’ see how it sounds.”

“I liked the verse about your mum.”

“Nah, it was rank. Kid stuff. Sentimental.”

Zayn frowned, sipped his beer. “I thought it was the best part.”

“Well, you’re fuckin wrong then, aincha.”

“Man, what difference does it make -- ‘shaped’ or ‘raised’. It’s like, a metaphor anyway, right? Look, if Leigh-Anne wants to produce it, we’ll re-record it and you can change it then if you still want.” 

Niall was shaking his head. “She won’t want to. There’s no way if she hears it like this. She’s gonna think I’m Aaron bloody Carter.” He was peeling the label compulsively, his leg jittering under the table, and he had crazy eyes. It was annoying, but Zayn could sympathize; he remembered what it felt like before Simon signed him, and Niall had been waiting forever. 

“Shit,” Niall was saying, gaze darting around the room. “I dunno any of these fuckin people.”

Zayn didn’t know anyone either. Everyone here was industry. He hadn’t even wanted to come to this party, but he’d promised Niall a chance to meet Leigh-Anne before they gave her Niall’s tape. (“I wanna be rat-arsed first time I meet her,” Niall had said grimly, “because then when I meet her for real like, it’ll be nowhere to go but up,” and Zayn hadn’t pushed the logic, because Niall was clearly in a state and couldn’t be reasoned with.)

“I need to calm down,” Niall said now, still looking miserable. “Off to find food. If Leigh-Anne comes over, just like, distract her or something.” 

“Get your shit together, you’re a mess,” Zayn said encouragingly, and pushed him off. He was watching Niall thread his way through the crowd when he felt the sudden tap on his shoulder. 

Liam Payne was standing behind him, sturdy and comfortable, smiling in that easy familiar way.

“Zayn Malik,” he said. “How’s it going, man?”

“Hey,” Zayn said, unable to help smiling back, reaching out to grab Liam’s hand in a quick shake. “Right side up this time.”

“More or less,” Liam said. He was wearing a black vest, tight white button-down beneath, like a 1940s journalist after hours. His forearms were bare and thick. Zayn glimpsed a tantalizing corner of his clavicle tattoo, whatever it was, under the open collar of his shirt. The whole look was really, really painful. 

“What are you doing here, man?” Liam asked. “Wouldn’t have thought this’d be your scene.”

It surprised Zayn, threw him a little off-balance; like, what would make Liam think that, how would he know? It felt like that was supposed to be _his_ line. 

“It’s not,” he said after a second. “What are you doing here?”

“Oh, you know.” Liam gestured around the room. “Love this stuff. I’m at one of these every night. Wouldn’t you guess?”

“You came with a friend too, huh,” Zayn said.

“It’s that obvious?” Liam cast a little rueful glance over his shoulder. “My sister, actually. It sucks for her, like, imagine, you have this brother with all these cool opportunities and connections and stuff, and he never even goes to the parties, he just mopes around whining about capitalism and workers’ exploitation and whatever.”

Zayn couldn’t help laughing. “That’s rough.”

“Yeah. So I bring her around to stuff when I hear Justin Timberlake’s gonna be there.”

“Is he?” Zayn said, glancing around the room with new interest.

“Somewhere. Haven’t you met him?”

“No. Wanted to for ages, it keeps not working out. Have you?”

“A couple times,” Liam said, smiling a little bashfully.

“Cool,” Zayn said, slightly awed. 

“Can I, uh,” Liam said, gesturing at Niall’s empty chair, and Zayn nodded, scooted back a little to make room. 

*

“Oh, come on,” Liam was saying. He stabbed the table with his finger. “You can’t be coy with me, man, I know! I’ve seen the videos. It’s you like, just, surrounded by people who are just -- like, ‘sexy’ doesn’t even cover -- they’re from _space_ , these people grinding up on you. From Planet Holy Shit. And you have such a great voice, and you’re doing that R&B eyebrows thing, the camera face --”

“What? Eyebrows face?” Zayn demanded. His cheeks almost ached from smiling like an idiot for fifteen minutes. It was so easy with Liam, like they’d known each other forever. It was hard to tell, even, if they were flirting; it felt too comfortable for that.

“I’m not going to try to do the face. If I could do the face, I wouldn’t be in punk rock,” Liam said. “I’d never have gotten angry, because I could’ve gotten whatever I wanted all the time.” He bit down on his straw, teasing.

Zayn flicked a rolled-up ball of cocktail napkin at him. “I don’t do a face.”

“You do,” Liam said, flicking it back. “It’s like. You know. I look into the camera and people think I’m going to reach through and beat them up. But when _you_ make those eyes, it’s --”

“You know what, no,” Zayn interrupted. “Big talk, I don’t think you’re that badass. You’re so nice, look at you. You’re so,” he gestured helplessly, “sweet. You meditate. You care about things. I bet you foster puppies and stuff. I bet you have one at home right now, scruffy little guy with one ear, called -- I don’t know -- ‘Che,’ or --” 

A wide, embarrassed smile broke over Liam’s face, and he dropped his head as if acknowledging a hit. “Loki has both ears,” he said.

“Okay, so he has one leg. He’s like a furry croquet mallet.” 

“A fucking -- croquet mallet?” Liam said through a rolling cough of laughter.

“Like a pogo stick. Or he has dog asthma. You have his little inhaler and you --”

“He’s _fine_ ,” Liam said, shaking his head. His grin was enormous, irresistible. “A pogo stick, Jesus.” 

Over the speakers the song changed, and Zayn recognized the beat instantly and wondered, with a flare of nervous panic or pride or something, if Liam would. It wasn’t one of his bigger singles, but still. 

“Ohhhhh,” Liam said, widening his eyes. “Hey!”

“Shit,” Zayn said. He grinned, then tried to change the expression because it seemed cocky, frowned, realized he should’ve played up the cocky thing, flinched weirdly, and hid his heated face in his glass. 

“So modest,” Liam said. He poked Zayn’s arm. “Cut it out, I love this one. It’s so like, Usher in '01. Your voice is amazing.” He dropped the compliments so casually that Zayn almost didn’t even want to squirm away from them. “I like how you riff, man, it’s like -- it’s graceful, it’s not too much, you know?”

“Stop,” Zayn mumbled, hunching up behind his drink. 

Liam reached out and pulled the glass down. His fingers were warm, ringed loosely around Zayn’s wrist.

“ _You_ stop,” he said. His forehead was wrinkled up, his eyes fond. “You have an unbelievable voice, own it. The guy in those videos knows exactly how good he is. Give me the look, come on, let’s see it.”

“You’re not exactly the same guy either,” Zayn said, sort of defensively. “Onstage screaming about like, ‘kill all the rapists.’”

“That’s still me,” Liam said. He shrugged one shoulder, letting go of Zayn’s wrist. “You know how that is,” he said, and his voice was totally sure, like he knew Zayn really well. Like they were old friends. ”The person you get to be up there, you know.”

“I guess,” Zayn said. He did know.

Suddenly Liam tilted his head a little, like a dog seeing something interesting. “Hey,” he said. “Didn’t you say you were going to introduce your friend to your producer?”

“Yeah,” Zayn said, and turned to follow Liam’s gaze. He saw them at once, caught in the blue beam of a spotlight. Niall was on the dance floor, his snapback pulled low, one thigh in between Leigh-Anne’s. He couldn’t see Niall’s face, but Leigh was grinning like a wolf, and they were grinding hard -- his hand spread over the lowest dip of her bare back, her arm slung around his neck -- before the shadows swallowed them again. 

“Huh,” Zayn said, blinking.

“Bless this progress in the world,” Liam said piously, “where men finally have to use their sexuality to get what they want from powerful women.” 

“Feminism,” Zayn agreed, raising his glass. Liam clinked his against it, very seriously. 

“She produce this one?” Liam lifted his chin, indicating the song still throbbing over the system.

“Nah, this was Abel,” Zayn said. 

“Like, Abel Tesfaye? The Weeknd? That Abel?”

“Yeah.”

Liam blew out an impressed little noise. “No big deal or anything.”

Zayn shrugged a shoulder awkwardly.

Liam watched him for a moment, that curiously intimate warmth in his eyes. Then he said, a laugh under his voice, “does it weird you out, like, knowing your mates have probably got off to your music?”

Zayn felt his ears heat up, a surprised bark of laughter pulling out of him. “No they haven’t. Have they? D’you think?”

“I’m not saying,” Liam said, grinning at him. He had a sweet little crease at the corner of his mouth when he smiled, not a dimple exactly. “But half the beats on this album are The Weeknd and half of them are --” he nodded in Leigh-Anne’s direction -- “Missy’s number one protegee, so like, it’s a _bit_ sexy.”

Zayn wasn’t sure what gave him the courage -- the drinks, the low light, the softness in Liam’s voice under his jokey tone -- but his voice was unexpectedly steady as he said, “So have you, then?”

“Have I what?”

“Got off to my music.”

There was an odd little silence, the song’s low beat throbbing through it, the lights moving softly over the room. Then Liam’s brow wrinkled up and he ducked his head. Even in the half-light Zayn could see the blush that swept over his face. For a second he looked off-kilter, not as assured as he’d seemed all night: shy, awkward, young. 

“Er, no,” he said. 

Zayn should have known how to follow that one up, but he didn’t -- and in the instant he might have figured it out, the waitress stopped by their table again, eyebrows lifted expectantly. 

“Another vodka tonic,” Zayn told her. “And -- what’re you drinking?”

“Ginger ale, thanks,” Liam said, smiling at the waitress. She was gone in a second, and Liam looked back at Zayn, as if he were waiting for the question. 

“You don’t drink? Or just not tonight?”

“No, I don’t at all,” Liam said. 

“Why not?” Zayn said, and then felt like the universe’s hugest tit. “I mean, it’s not -- it’s none of my business. If you don’t, you don’t.”

“Nah, it’s all right,” Liam said. His big hands were wrapped a little too tightly around the glass, empty of everything but ice, and Zayn could see the tattoos crawling up his wrists. He was so gorgeous, fuck. “I’m in AA. Uh, it’ll be -- seven years come September.”

“Oh,” Zayn said, flushing. “Shit. I’m sorry, I’ve been, this whole time--” 

“No,” Liam said fast, “that’s all right, that’s fine. I don’t mind you drinking, or like, other people. I mean, are you kidding? The scene I’m in, the band? I couldn’t function. No, it’s just me, _I_ don’t, but it’s not a big deal.”

Zayn was asking before he could stop himself, “Seven years? I thought you were like, my age.”

“What’s your age?” 

What was wrong with him? Honestly. What. “Twenty-six. I’m sorry, I’m -- I’m so up in your business, we don’t even know each other. You don’t have to --”

“Got sober when I was nineteen,” Liam said, and then almost as if he couldn’t help it added, “Wrapped my girlfriend’s car round a tree. With her in it, as well. We both came through, but it was close, and at that point it was like -- after I got out of the hospital, I was pretty much done. Had to be.” 

“...Jesus,” Zayn said, stupidly.

“I don’t mind talking about it anymore,” Liam said. He’d lowered his eyes, but he glanced back up at Zayn for a moment and they were warm, reassuring. 

“Yeah, but like, I don’t know, I’ve never met anyone who -- talked about it, I guess,” Zayn said. “So I feel like a fucking -- like an idiot. Sorry.”

Liam’s eyes crinkled up again, “You’re not an idiot,” he said. 

Suddenly behind him was a guy in a black tank top -- hair in a Frank Gehry swoop, piercings gleaming from eyebrow and lip -- who vised hands on Liam’s shoulders and shook him hard, yelling “Leemo! You made it!” He glanced up at Zayn and added, “Sitting with the VIPs, too, aren’t we?” and Zayn realized it was Louis Tomlinson.

It didn’t get less weird, somehow, seeing people up close whose faces you knew already. Or at least it hadn’t gotten less weird for Zayn, and he’d been topping the charts for almost four years now, on everybody’s list, invited to these parties, meeting these people. Still. It was something about scale: something about the size of people in real life, the changeability of those familiar faces. They seemed so much smaller. 

“Louis Tomlinson,” the guy said, sticking out a hand. “Les Rogues.”

“I know who you are,” Zayn said, shaking it. “Zayn Malik. Nice to meet you.”

“I know who you are too, sunshine, but we still live in human society and I wasn’t raised in a barn, so,” Louis Tomlinson said. The lip ring gave his grin a slightly demonic edge, like a snaggled fang. 

“Louis,” Liam said, craning his neck back. “Be nice.” 

“Shan’t,” Louis said, and bent to kiss the fuzzy top of Liam’s head. He hooked a chair from a nearby table, spun it around and straddled it. Then he widened his eyes at Zayn, as if expecting Zayn to say something or object.

Liam said apologetically, “Don’t worry about him. We’ve known each other since forever.”

“Since Payne’s wild days,” Louis said. He was still smiling, but there was a measuring challenge in his stare. That was understandable: if Liam Payne were Zayn’s territory, he’d want to defend that with his teeth bared too. 

“Since before Tommo sold out,” Liam corrected. “Zayn and I met at Angie’s. He’s good people, Lou, don’t be a dick.”

“Ugh, has he got you meditating?” Louis said, looking at Zayn with a little more sympathy, mouth in a moue of understanding distaste. “That awful place. He made me go once, too, out to fucking Malibu at fuck o’clock in the morning--”

“--It was, like, _maybe_ nine a.m.,” Liam objected.

“--Bruising my ass on that hippie concrete floor, trying to imagine myself in a golden field with butterflies. Why would I _ever_ again?”

“I only went once,” Zayn admitted. “I’m not really a morning person.”

“Oh, well that’s a good sign,” Louis said, his smile softening into something lighter, more mischievous. “Do you smoke? How are your eating habits?”

“Yes. Awful.”

“Excellent,” Louis said, pleased. “I like you. You can stay. Payne needs more very unhealthy friends. I can’t keep at it alone, it’s paddling fully upstream. With his fucking green tea and his Tibetan bell relaxation CDs and his Tantric masturbation --”

“Please stop,” Liam said. 

“Oooh, is he getting embarrassed in front of his new friend?” Louis cooed, bending over Liam’s shoulders and snatching at his nipples with the deft expertise of a professional torturer. Liam shrank in on himself, grappling Louis’s hands away, spilling laughter, flushed and trying to be annoyed but still so fond. 

They were sweet. It was hard even to feel bad about Liam very probably being taken (though Zayn still did, the disappointment a little twinge in his belly) when it was edged with that shiver of possibility. If maybe Liam could be into guys. He hadn’t found anything about Liam’s love life, girls or boys, anywhere during his creepy stalking period. 

“Hey, listen,” Louis said, surfacing abruptly. Liam was still clinging to his wrist, the touch so easy and intimate, blush fading down his face and neck. “Want to go to a concert on Tuesday, Zayn Malik? Friend of ours. I’ve got like a million extra tickets, can’t give them away for love nor money.”

“Well, Jesus, Lou, no wonder, you make it sound like some teenage neighbor’s shitty band,” Liam said. His eyes were fixed on Zayn: Zayn couldn’t exactly read his expression. “It’s gonna be really good. Ever hear St. Agatha?” 

The name was familiar, and in a second Zayn remembered why: Frank wanted them for a sample on his own album. He’d played Zayn some of their stuff once when they were pretty blazed, ethereal symphonic folk with kind of an edge to it, and Zayn had liked it, though it had made him sad. “Oh, yeah -- my friend Frank’s real into them. Her?”

“Him, actually,” Louis said. “Also, the way you said ‘friend’ you meant somebody famous, didn’t you? Who is it? Frank who?”

“Fucking come on, Louis!” Liam burst out, rubbing his forehead. He really was embarrassed, Zayn realized, and wanted him not to be, no matter how cute it was.

“Uh, Frank Ocean? The--”

“I know who Frank Ocean is too, funny new friend,” Louis said. “Do you think he’d want --”

“You _know_ Frank Ocean?” Liam interrupted, looking up round-eyed. 

“Yeah,” Zayn said, and couldn’t help adding, “we’re pretty good friends, actually.” It had been a while since he wanted to impress someone so badly, and Liam’s face was worth it.

“I think he’s a fucking genius, man,” Liam said. “Do you guys, like, hang out?”

A smile tugged Zayn’s mouth half-unwillingly upward. “Yeah, a lot.”

Liam’s eyes opened even wider, reverent, almost glowing. “No way.”

“That’s it,” Louis said, throwing up his hands. “I’ve lost him. He’s gone. Take care of Liam, Zayn Malik, he’s your problem now. He’s, like, full sign-my-titties status for Frank Ocean.” 

“You know, we were actually having a nice conversation, Zayn and me,” Liam said, dropping his fists to the table, “before you swanned over to make me look like an asshole.”

“So do you want to come to this concert?” Louis said to Zayn, ignoring Liam. “Got any friends who might want to come? Friends like Frank Ocean? If you bring him, Liam will cry. He’s a very attractive crier. Listen, give me your phone. I’m going to call my phone, and then you’ll have my number, so you can text me if you want tickets and how many, and I’ll let you know where -- it’s somewhere on West Sunset, I can never remember. Is that your phone on the table? Here, just let me do it. Why don’t you have a lock code?”

“Never needed one,” Zayn said, bewildered but also sort of charmed. 

“I’ll call Li’s number in here too, while I’m at it,” Louis said, typing busily away. “Honestly, Zayn Malik, you’re too famous not to have a lock on your phone. Get it together. What if someone hacks your nudes?”

Zayn’s ears went hot. “I don’t --”

“But what if you do someday? What if you want to? I’ll set it up for you, even. Something easy to remember. What year were you born?”

“Give him his phone back, you fucking monster,” Liam said, twisting around abruptly. Louis tried to jerk the phone away, but he was too slow; there was a brief struggle, which Liam won by yanking Louis’s forearm sideways until Louis yelped and let go. Liam flicked his ear and handed the phone back. “Here.”

“Thanks,” Zayn said. He wasn’t sure how to react, wasn’t sure whether he was being included in something or shut out of it. He wondered for an instant what it would be like to have permission to touch Liam like that, casually, everywhere. He thought, if he were allowed, he’d be more careful.

“Louis is -- he’s like this,” Liam said. He was definitely blushing. “I know. Sorry.”

“Text us,” Louis said, standing, “about the concert. Come. Bring Frank Ocean. Watch Liam revert to age twelve, it’ll be a riot. Hurry up now, Payne, you’re needed. We’ve got to rescue Justin Timberlake from Ruth. Your sister has wiles, and JT’s a married man.”

Liam resisted a little as he was dragged up. “But -- we’re in the middle of -- Zayn, do you want to come meet him? And meet my sister? You could --”

“Nah, that’s all right,” Zayn said. “Should wait for Niall here anyway. But, uh, nice -- nice talking to you.”

“I’m really, really sorry,” Liam said again. His expression was absurdly apologetic, almost puppyish, and then he was dragged off into the crowd. 

Zayn chewed on his straw for a while, waiting. He wondered if Niall were coming back at all, or if he’d just gone home with Leigh. He turned his phone over, checked it. 

There was nothing from Niall, but there were already five from an unknown number. 

_Sorryyyy !! lou’s the worstttttttt Im gunna punch him in the junk so much_

_Anyways I hope you come to the concern even tho Louis._

_Concert not concern jeez ... sorry againnn im stupid_

_This is Liam Payne by the way_

_Sorryyy_

There was no way. There was no way Liam Payne, the one with the tattoos and the arm muscles and the shaved head, the guy shutting people down on Youtube, texted like this. Zayn stared at the screen for a minute, a helpless smile suffusing his face.

“Who’s it you’re texting?” Niall asked, sliding sweaty and flushed into his chair. His snapback was gone, and his hair stood up in little haphazard tufts. There was a shiny pink smear of lip gloss at the corner of his mouth.

“That’s the least important question right now,” Zayn said, quickly pocketing his phone. “How’d your, uh, business meeting go? Your super professional --”

“Ahh, _jaysus_ ,” Niall said, sliding down in his seat, a blissful, doped-out smile spreading across his face. “I’m fuckin in love, mate. I’m like, this is it for me. The _mind_ on that one. The body on her. That woman. That _woman._ ”

“Was it the craic?” Zayn asked solemnly, and grinned when Niall flopped up an automatic middle finger. “What’d you do, make out in a booth?”

“Went down on her in the ladies’, wasn’t it,” Niall said dreamily. “Lord, if I die tomorrow my soul may wing home in peace, for I have been blessed this night.”

“Did you tell her about the mixtape?”

“Did I fuck! Don’t think I even remembered I’d got one, I was that occupied.” He looked around, seeming to register where he was for the first time. “Christ, you’re not telling me you’ve been sitting here being handsome at nobody all fuckin night, you poor sad bastard?”

“Nah,” Zayn said, and there was a curious little hiccup in his stomach, as if telling Niall would betray something important. “Ran into some friends. You got back just in time. Tell me about it.” 

*

He got a text from Leigh in the cab home, Niall snoozing gently against his shoulder. _If yr friend’s spit game is half as good as his tongue game he can send me a demo whenever_

_fuckin a, la!!! don’t wanna know_

_just saying. good stuff. good enunciation. fun accent. v marketable._

_ps if he wants his hat back too bad im keeping it as a trophy_

_night night zaynie sweet dreams xx :)_

“Oh, yuck,” Zayn said aloud. Niall nuzzled against his shoulder, smiling contentedly in his sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The day of the St. Agatha concert was also the first time he got papped leaving Frank’s house. Wearing -- as someone on the internet would definitely notice -- the same clothes he’d been in the night before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Haha, well, it's only been TWO YEARS since I've written anything!!! Whatever. Thanks to the beautiful Val [threeturn](http://archiveofourown.org/users/threeturn) and Eva [pukeandcry](http://archiveofourown.org/users/pukeandcry) for letting me yell at them, and to Brenna Rubdown without whom this would not exist.

The day of the St. Agatha concert was also the first time he got papped leaving Frank’s house. Wearing -- as someone on the internet would definitely notice -- the same clothes he’d been in the night before. It wasn’t so much the fact that it had happened that surprised him; more that it was the first time.

“Hey, Zayn, how are you? You guys dating?” the photographer called from the sidewalk. He was white, maybe Zayn’s dad’s age, with glasses and a limp fall of gray hair. “You and Frank, you guys sleeping together? You boyfriends? Help me out here, Zayn, buddy, my niece is a big fan.” The camera was shudder-clicking the whole time. Its insect eye winked over and over at him.

Zayn slipped his sunglasses on, gave the dude the necessary tooth-baring smile. “Nah man, just crashed with a friend,” he said calmly, and dropped into his car. The guy started yelling follow-ups. Zayn turned up the AC really loud.

He had a headache already, a cool stone of pain right behind his eyes. It took him twenty minutes into the drive to realize it was from how hard he’d been clenching his jaw, his knuckles white on the wheel. 

*

Frank called about three seconds after Zayn got home, like he was psychic. Or maybe he had a Google Alert: twenty minutes from shot to post was probably more than enough time for TMZ to get a story online, or fucking Perez to draw jizz on his eyelashes. 

“You all right, man?” Frank sounded really concerned. “I told security. Shit. I’m sorry.”

Zayn shrugged before he remembered Frank couldn’t see him. “It’s not a big deal. Was just in your driveway, there wasn’t anything -- you know -- about it. Anyway even if they wanna say stuff about me, it’s never been, like, a secret.” 

That much was true. People talked a lot on the internet, guys he’d hooked up with as well as girls, and he’d never been that careful in interviews. He knew for a fact that he’d been written up on one of those deep-web groupie review sites -- with a dude reviewer -- but he couldn’t bring himself to read it. He’d made Niall click on it instead, just to tell him what grade he got. (An A-minus, Niall had dutifully reported, although “No, I don’t fuckin know why it’s not a fuckin A, and you can read it your own be-damned self if you’re so eager for the details of your own arse banditry, _Christ_ almighty.”)

“You don’t think that,” Frank said. “But there’s gonna be bullshit, there always is. I know you can handle it, but just remember I’m here for you.” 

“That’s really sweet, Frankie,” Zayn said. He meant it, but he knew it sounded sarcastic. Frank snort-laughed into the phone.

*

 

It hadn’t even occurred to him to worry about it until he got the text from Louis Tomlinson that just said, _SHUT U P_

_lol uh ... i didn’t say anything ?_

_U SAID FRANK OCEAN WAS UR FAMOUS FRIEND NOT UR SLAM PIECE U SECRETIVE LIL MINX_ Louis wrote back. Zayn could picture his manic little typing face, even. _lol Liams gonna d i e_

Zayn’s stomach went cold. He hovered over the phone for a second, not sure what to type, and finally wrote _uh bit out of line mate? we dont really know each other .._

_WE WILL SOON !!! but ok . lips r sealed & li doesnt read tmz hes got like moral objctns to gossip . ur still in for concert tonite yeah xx_

An unwilling smile tugged at the corner of Zayn’s mouth. Fucking Louis.

_k just don’t be wierd_

_mmmm ya we’ll see ,_ Louis wrote back.

*

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d agonized so much about getting ready for something. Admittedly he liked to look good, he usually put in an effort, but not -- he didn’t get crazy about it, the way he was getting now. 

It wasn’t as if he didn’t know how he looked, on a basic level. It was hard not to know. But he knew too that he had this tendency to overplay it. Depending on how he did his hair sometimes he looked a little _too_ handsome, in like a boring mannequin way. He’d seen himself on TV looking like that, and it was always humiliatingly obvious how hard he was trying. Pouting into the camera, kind of squinting his eyes. 

So he didn’t want to do that. Especially if the main person he wanted to impress was so kind and genuine and down to earth and not at all superficial, a person who was so unconcerned with his hair that he had shaved it all off. Zayn couldn’t be all buffed up like he was doing a car ad. 

On the other hand he had to try a _little_. If he got papped looking scrubby it might seem like he was depressed about the TMZ thing, which he absolutely was not. Black jeans were probably safe, but then what? A button-down was too date-y. And t-shirts were a risk because what if there was something about them that Liam would object to for moral reasons Zayn didn’t know about? Liam would know about stuff like that. 

And actually that was a problem with the shoes, too. Now that he thought about it, every pair of shoes he owned had probably been made by some exploited child making pennies, but he had never _considered_ it, because he was an _asshole_.

He needed a break.

His stash was in a little wooden box under his bed, like it was a secret. Holdover from high school, probably -- like one of his aunties might come in and try to clean. He wanted a joint, specifically. It was the ceremony of the thing he liked, the grounding ritual, like a tea service. Opening the box, neatly laying everything out. The heft of the grinder, the smooth crunch, the sweet smell. The paper on his tongue. 

He lit up and wandered down to the deck, squinting his eyes against the sunlight. Rolled his jeans up and sat on the side of the pool, gazing down at the green hills, thinking about nothing. The water felt cool and good on his calves, and the sky was a bright, lazy blue, threaded with shocks of white cloud.

 

After a while he came back into the closet and surveyed his options for a few minutes. Then he called Frank.

“Hey. What do I look good in?”

“Don’t be gross, man, you know you always look good.” He was chewing something, Zayn could hear it down the line. “Except in those -- damn sweat-shorts you have. Fucking, midi-length cutoffs, whatever the hell --”

“I know, but like.” He picked up a v-neck from the back of his desk chair and sniffed at it. It was probably clean. “Does James Perse have good, like, factory conditions, do you know? Is that why it costs more?”

“Are you getting hassled?” Frank’s voice got a little sharp. “Somebody get through your gate or something? Need me to --”

“No, Jesus -- you mean about the TMZ thing? Nobody cares that much,” Zayn said, annoyed, hoping it was true. “No, but I uh -- I’m going to this concert tonight, and --”

“Yeah, St. Agatha, right? Wish I could come.” By the time Zayn had gotten around to inviting him Frank had already scheduled some kind of thing with Tyler, some ritual dudes’ night they did every couple of months where they got high and played Smash Brothers Melee and found each other screamingly hilarious. Zayn was always politely invited, in the expectation that he would always politely say no, which he always did. “You gotta tell me how he is. His band is sick, I know the cellist.”

“I will, but so anyway it’s -- I don’t want to look, you know, like I’m trying to be impressive.”

“But you still want to impress somebody?”

Zayn hummed noncommittally. “You know,” he said.

“What’s he do? She?”

“He’s a musician.”

“You got a type.” Frank was amused now, and Zayn was relieved to hear it. He couldn’t stand Frank worrying about him.

“I know, whatever,” Zayn said. “What are you eating? I can hear you chewing.”

“Kale chips. Just you and him?”

For some reason Zayn’s ears went hot at the question. “No, like -- a bunch of people. Niall’s coming too.”

Frank’s laugh was comforting. “That’s cute, man. You’re like in high school.”

“Maybe you in high school. I never had a date in high school,” Zayn said, and then hastily, “Not that this is a date.”

“Wear that old Stevie Wonder tee you have,” Frank said after a second. “The red one. Skinnies and black Timbs. Wear your glasses. Smell nice.”

“I always smell nice,” Zayn said, mildly offended.

“Gucci Black. And don’t gel your hair up too much. You’re less scary with it down.”

“Scary?” Zayn echoed.

“Yeah, dude, you look scary as hell sometimes, I mean it. Like a little sexy robot or some shit. People don’t want to talk to you when you’re all quiffed up.”

“What?” Zayn said. “A -- sex robot? Are you -- is that a compliment, or -- what do you mean little?”

“Just wear it down tonight, man,” Frank said firmly. “And the glasses, like I said. Be a little soft for once.”

“It’s not a date,” Zayn said, just to be clear. 

“Then why’re you calling me about it, bro?”

“Because,” Zayn said, “shut up, dude,” and hung up the phone.

*

He’d been convinced that Louis had been fucking with him, but St. Agatha, as it turned out, really was a guy. A boy, really, or at least he looked like one under the smoky blue lights of the little club stage: pretty, all limbs, with sprays of tiny white flowers woven into his curls. 

“That’s Harry,” Liam murmured, and Zayn tried not to lean in to the brief warm drag of Liam’s mouth against the curve of his ear. “He’s amazing, wait til you see.” There was a proprietary pride in his voice, the way there always was when Liam talked about his friends. That much Zayn had learned already.

Harry really was pretty great. He had a low, smoky voice, sweet and hoarse, and he moved with this charmingly goofy stiffness that fit well with his strange, cinematic songs. He was sexy, too -- weirdly, intensely sexy -- especially when he dropped the stumbly Bambi bit and really sang full-out, spine arched ecstatically, hair wild around his face, the veins standing out on his neck and arms. 

On the other hand Zayn had never seen anyone who went _on_ so much onstage, and so inanely. (“When I wrote this song, it was a bit....it was a funny day when I wrote this song because like, I’d gone up to this one bloke’s house who, I thought he was friends with my friend? But it turned out I was thinking of this other bloke, a different one, he lived somewhere else. So I had just sort of showed up at this guy’s house. But he let me stay, because it turned out I knew him through this other different friend which was why I’d got confused. Which I think sometimes some relationships are a bit like that, you know, like he, then he thought I was -- well we both thought...well anyway, it was a weird day, so here’s, uh, here’s the song I wrote about that day, it’s called ‘Animal Doctor,’ I hope you like it.”)

Still Harry pulled it off somehow. Probably by being gorgeous. That mouth could have occupied a lot of Zayn’s attention if not for Liam sitting next to him, thigh resting comfortably against Zayn’s own, smelling -- just a little -- of some clean, sporty cologne every time he leaned in to yell something in Zayn’s ear.

By the time the set ended Zayn was pleasantly buzzed, though he hadn’t had more than a couple of weak vodka tonics, plus the second joint he’d rolled for the ride over. It was more the low feeling of satisfaction that came from knowing he was doing well: that Liam was focusing on him, laughing at his jokes, biting his full lower lip like he was as self-conscious as Zayn was. 

“Good, right?” Liam said, leaning in close. Something about his smile felt private, as if he were asking about more than the music.

“Really good,” Zayn said. After the wail and buzz of Harry’s last song and the ending roar of chanting and applause, the ambient music of the club seemed small and far-off, just a tinny beat over the mumble of leftover conversation. Only Liam seemed close and warm still. A couple of people in the audience had recognized them, but they were trying to be good: whispering, pausing awkwardly, turning around and holding their phones as if to take selfies, like Zayn and Liam’s table just happened to be in the background.

“You think that’s worse?” Zayn asked softly, tilting his head toward the group. “Than if they just came up and asked?”

Liam shrugged, stirring his seltzer water with the dinky little straw. “They’re doing their best. They think it’s like -- less intrusive. They don’t know.” 

“I guess it’s not their fault,” Zayn said. “That all of it’s intrusive, like.”

Liam smiled without looking at him, slow and soft. “I guess not.”

Harry had been shaking hands over by the front of the stage. Now he sauntered over to them and enveloped Louis in his long arms, digging his nose under Louis’s ear, mouth against Louis’s throat, eyes fluttering contentedly closed. Louis grumbled, but his hand came up to skim possessively over Harry’s waist, and Zayn thought, _oh, so_ that’s -- except then Harry surfaced, saw Liam, and his grin broadened. 

“ _Lee_ yum,” he said, dragging the name out rough and slow, and wrapped Liam up in an embrace nearly as tender and intense as the one he’d given Louis, even pressing a light kiss to the corner of Liam’s mouth. Zayn looked away after a second, cupped his hands around his glass.

“Hiya, Styles,” Liam said, laughing as he scrubbed through Harry’s curls. “Want you to meet some people. That one’s Niall, and this is Zayn.”

“Hi Niall,” Harry said, and swooped Niall up for another of those long hugs. Niall returned it cheerfully -- he was a cuddler -- and remained totally unfazed when Harry nuzzled into his shoulder as if he were smelling it. 

Then Harry’s wide green eyes were on Zayn. “Hi, Zayn Malik.”

“Hi,” Zayn said. “Great show.”

“I really love your work,” Harry said. Then he pulled Zayn in and kissed him, quickly and gently, on his closed mouth. His lips were soft, a little gummy: he smelled like sweat and vanilla and red wine. 

When he let go, Zayn said, “Oh. Uh, thanks.” He raised his hand, then dropped it again, not wanting to be rude and like, wipe his mouth, but also sort of wanting to wipe his mouth. He darted a glance at Liam that might have been a little panicked.

“Harry,” Liam said gently. “You’re doing the thing.” Louis was laughing hysterically. Liam leaned in and squeezed Zayn’s arm, just to reassure him, but his clean woodsy scent flickered in Zayn’s nostrils and Zayn had to blink off a dizzy swoop of arousal. 

“Oh,” Harry said, face falling. “I’m sorry. I’m really comfortable with my body and like, I know I’m really tactile? And sometimes I forget how other people’s boundaries aren’t the same as mine?” He sounded genuinely contrite, but also a little rehearsed, like someone had coached him patiently through the speech. It was easy to imagine who. 

Zayn felt a smile tugging at his mouth. He couldn’t help it; Harry just looked so downcast. “It’s all right,” he said. “Just didn’t -- expect it.”

“I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” Harry said earnestly.

Zayn shrugged. “You can kiss me next time, when I know it’s coming,” he said, and smiled at Harry. Harry glowed back, his cheeks a little pink. He really was quite something. 

“Yes, good, everyone kiss everyone,” Louis said. “That’s how it works around here.” He slung his elbow around Niall’s neck and laid a sound smack to his cheek. Those two were getting along like gangbusters already; before the music even started they’d been playing some inscrutable game with the bar peanuts and laughing like hyenas. “Kisses all round. Wonderful friendships blooming like a rose.”

“Shall we all go out, then?” Niall suggested. “Take these friendships out for a test drive, like.” Without looking exactly at anyone, he added, “Leigh texted, so we could maybe meet her out somewhere.”

“Leigh as in Leigh-Anne Pinnock?” said Louis.

“Yeah, we’re friends,” Niall said, very focused on his phone. Zayn, catching Liam’s meaningful glance, had to bite his lip to keep from laughing.

“Fantastic!” Louis said, eyes lighting up. “ Let’s go somewhere _disgusting._ Let’s be complete trash. Let’s go to Alibi and fight a go-go-dancer.”

“That sounds nice,” Harry said placidly. 

It would have been risky enough to go to a place like Alibi on a normal night. Tonight, after the TMZ thing, it was the last thing he could do. “I can’t,” Zayn said. He pushed his hair back, trying to think of a good reason. 

“Oh right,” Louis said, getting it and deflating slightly. “Well, we could go somewhere more low-key. Mate of mine owns a place on La Cienega--”

“No, you all should go out,” Zayn said. “I’m just like, I’m a bit knackered anyway. Got a lunch meeting tomorrow, so I’ll probably just crash. Not that I don’t want to -- like, some other night for sure --”

“Whatever, you old snooze, just go home and watch reruns with Frank Ocean,” Louis said. “Liam?” 

“Best not,” Liam said unexpectedly. Zayn blinked at him. “Early yoga tomorrow.”

A derisive chorus erupted from Louis and Niall. Harry draped himself over Liam’s shoulders, tucking his chin into Liam’s neck. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, love,” Liam said. He ruffled Harry’s hair again, laid a kiss to the top of his head, and then released him. “You lot go on.”

“Well, namaste to _you_ then, you tedious killjoys,” Louis said, hooking an arm through Niall’s, and poked his tongue out. “Come on, leave these two to their sadness naps.” 

“Bye Liam,” Harry said, kissing Liam’s cheek, and then, hovering awkwardly, “bye, Zayn.” 

“Nah, go on,” Zayn said, and offered the side of his face. Harry smiled, soft and radiant, and leaned in to kiss him very gently on the ear. Then he was sloping off, Niall and Louis with him.

“Twat,” Liam said fondly. “Didn’t even ask how I’d get home.”

“Louis?”

“Yeah, he was my ride.” He had his phone out. “Fuck him, I’ll get an Uber and steal his wallet later.”

“I can take you.” It came out fast, too eager. 

Liam’s laugh was low and warm. “You’re so fucking nice. You don’t even know where I live.”

Zayn made himself shrug. “It’s whatever,” he said.

“No it’s not. Where are you going?” 

“It’s early,” Zayn hedged. “I don’t mind going a little out of the way.” He was going to say that it was his driver who’d have to deal with it, anyway, but stopped. Liam’s soft look made him feel like an asshole that he had a driver at all; he didn’t need to say it aloud. 

“You going east or west?” Liam asked.

“I have -- I mean, I live in Bel Air, but. Got a friend in Los Feliz I’ve been meaning to see, so I might go east.”

Liam lifted an eyebrow, skeptical but still smiling. “Just dropping by at one in the morning?”

Zayn shrugged again, awkwardly. There wasn’t any friend in Los Feliz and he knew what it sounded like. He didn’t like Liam thinking he slept around, but he couldn’t think of another way to get him to just shut up and accept the damn ride. 

Liam’s face had changed, his brows drawing up in concern. “Sorry, man. Sorry. It’s none of my business, I didn’t mean to seem --” He was actually blushing, his ears pinked up and the back of his neck. Zayn wanted to kiss him so badly it felt like he barely had himself in hand: like if he moved he’d find his mouth pressed to Liam’s skin without meaning to. “I’d -- sorry, yeah. I mean I’d love a ride, if you’re sure. If it’s no trouble.”

“Nah,” Zayn said. “You want another -- um, seltzer, or you wanna go now?”

“I could get another,” Liam said.

*

The main thing Zayn was worried about by the time they left was what Liam would think of his car. It was the Escalade tonight, and he’d look like a jerk probably -- but to be honest he wasn’t really that worried. About anything. He felt good: he was still a little buzzed, laughing about some dumb joke Liam had made, and Liam was laughing back, holding the door for him as he shrugged on his jacket. So when he stepped out and the roar exploded, the flashbulbs popping and shuffling, it startled him like it hadn’t done in years. He threw a hand up over his eyes -- hadn’t done that in years, either -- and heard Liam swear. 

They were yelling Zayn’s name, and Frank’s. “Are you gay, Zayn? You gay?” “Hey Zayn, you wanna tell your fans what’s up?” “Zayn, where’s Frank’s album?” “You spend a lot of nights with Frank Ocean, Zayn?” That was bad enough, but then it was like they all realized at once who Liam was, and then they closed in, yelling at _him_. Instinctively Zayn backed up, the way he would have done for his sisters, blocking Liam from the cameras. Liam’s hands pressed against Zayn’s back, like he would have pushed him off.

“Are you guys dating, Liam?” “Hey, what do you say to the gay rumors, Liam?” “Liam, you and Frank must be friends, what’s going on there?” They were jostling in, cornering them. One guy’s camera lens hit Zayn’s forearm. 

“Jesus Christ,” Liam said, and pushed his shoulder into Zayn’s, almost like he was trying to get in front of him. He must have wanted to get away. “Hey, why don’t you guys fucking chill, huh?” His other hand was still warm and tense against Zayn’s back.

Then Alberto was there, pushing through the crush, getting his body around Liam and Zayn both somehow and shepherding them to the car. They scrambled in awkwardly, Liam half-pushing him in, heaving against him as he pulled the door closed. The yelling went muffled: through the tinted window the flashes were soft now.

“Jesus,” Liam said again, quietly.

“I was around the back,” Alberto said curtly from the driver’s seat, gunning the engine. “You told me you were coming out the back.”

He’d forgotten. Inside the club, as he bent to get his jacket, Liam had lightly touched the back of his neck to tuck the tag inside his shirt collar. His fingertips had seemed to linger for an instant at the nape of Zayn’s neck, cool and light, and Zayn had stopped thinking about which door they were headed for.

“I’m sorry,” he said to Alberto, and then, “I’m really sorry,” to Liam. “Sorry,” he said one more time, for both of them. 

“What?” Liam said. “No, no. It’s not your fault. Are you okay?” In the low light of the backseat Zayn could just see his eyes, big and worried.

“Oh, yeah,” Zayn said. He laughed for some reason, a sharp weird laugh. “Sorry.”

Liam shook his head. “Don’t. Don’t be sorry. That was insane. Seriously, are you okay?”

“It’s so stupid,” Zayn tried to explain. “It’s this -- I was -- got papped at Frank’s house this morning, it -- I didn’t think it would turn into anything.”

“You don’t have to explain,” Liam said. His grip was firm and careful on Zayn’s arm.

Alberto was pulling a neat U-turn, pointing them west. “Hey,” Zayn said, leaning forward. “Uh, hold up, we’re going -- east, actually. To --” He looked inquiringly back at Liam for the address. 

“Oh, fuck,” Liam said, blanching. “No, don’t. I can’t make you, after all the -- can I just get a cab from your place?”

“Nah, bro, that’s like an extra -- it’ll be like three hours before you get home. Don’t you have an early day?”

“No, I just didn’t want to go out,” Liam said reasonably. “Louis shuts down when I say ‘yoga,’ I knew it’d get him off my back. Please, seriously, please don’t drive all the way to -- I can’t stand making you do that.”

Alberto had pulled over, waiting for instructions. “Better let me know where we’re going or they’re gonna catch up,” he said conversationally, nodding at the cameramen, who were hustling across the street toward them.

“Okay,” Zayn said, relenting. “Okay, fine, let’s just -- Berto, let’s just go home, but --.” He cut an anxious glance at Liam. “You can’t...do you mind just staying over? Just, it’s a crazy drive, it’ll be easier. I’ve got so much room. Sorry, I know that’s, like. Trapping you in the fucking mountains --”

Liam nodded, but not really like he was agreeing. More like he was just checking in, confirming that he was listening. “Sure. We can figure that out when we get back, huh?”

“Sure,” Zayn echoed. “I’m really sorry,” he said again, helplessly. “I know it smells like weed back here.”

“Hey,” Liam said. He pulled Zayn back, tugged him close into the solid curve of his shoulder: Zayn felt himself hunch awkwardly, fighting the urge to snuggle into Liam’s neck. He huffed out a hard breath against Liam’s collar. After a second Liam let him go.

“You’re all right,” he said. His hand was still trapped between Zayn’s back and the seat. Zayn didn’t move to let him go, and Liam didn’t pull away.

“Yeah,” Zayn said.

“It was scary, though,” Liam said. He shook his head. “Guys come after me sometimes, but I’ve never -- it’s never like that. Is that normal?”

Zayn shrugged. “It wasn’t that bad, actually. I mean it gets worse.” 

“The fuck it does. How?”

“I mean, that was probably only five, six guys. It's worse when it's a dozen, especially if there's fans there too, or people pretending to be fans. It’s mostly like, if there’s a story about you happening right then, or if you’re involved with somebody else who’s like actually a really big deal. Like, when I broke up with my ex --” With anyone else he would have stopped there, the story had been probably the biggest thing that ever happened to him, but Louis had said Liam didn’t read gossip, so maybe he wouldn’t know. “She was in music too, and there were these rumors, like completely made up, crazy stuff.”

“Like what? What was the craziest?” 

“Um.” Zayn glanced at the ceiling of the car, his face heating up. “Like that I was cheating on her? Which was bad enough, but with, um, Rihanna? Who I’d met maybe twice before that? And I -- she’s a foot taller than me, she’s so much badder than me, like -- but everyone was all, ‘Zayn did you fuck Rihanna? Zayn, are you fighting with Chris Brown? Did Drake --’ whatever. And if I said anything it was like ‘Rihanna’s New Man Zayn Malik Curses Out Photographer.’ And then later I ran into her and she like, she didn’t even say anything, she just _looked_ at me, like -- ” Liam was groaning through a wave of commiserating laughter. “So that was -- embarrassing.”

“Rihanna?”

“Yeah.”

“So like, Rihanna hates you? That’s the scariest thing I’ve ever --”

“No, well -- it’s not that bad.” Actually she treated him with a kind of offhand, older-sisterly amusement that made him feel like an idiot. He’d tried sleeping with a couple of her girls, really brought his A-game with them, hoping Rih would get the message that he wasn’t just some embarrassing kid she’d been linked with. He wasn’t sure it had worked. The whole crew treated him that way now, even the ones who had fucked him. “I mean, we follow each other on Instagram now. We've laughed about it. But we’re not best friends. And at the time, I mean -- at the time it was shit.”

“God, I’m so sorry,” Liam said. His eyes were crinkled up, amused and horrified and and sympathetic. “Glamorous life.”

“Yeah, it’s not what people think,” Zayn said. 

*

He didn’t have to be nervous about the house, Zayn knew. _Pharrell_ had told him once that he loved the house, so. It was just maybe a little -- loud, that was all. A little braggy.

“Wow,” Liam said as they pulled up, the gate shutting behind them and the driveway lighting up automatically to guide them in. “All right.”

“I know,” Zayn said, half-apologetically. 

“Thanks so much, man,” Liam said. Zayn was about to tell him it was nothing when he realized Liam was talking to Alberto, of course -- reaching forward, shaking his hand. And usually after a night like this Alberto would have gotten on Zayn’s ass, said something about coming out the door he was supposed to come out, being more careful, all that stuff. But now he was uncharacteristically stiff in the front seat, returning Liam’s handshake with wooden formality, looking like an old timey chauffeur.

“Night, bro,” Zayn said loudly. _I pay him really well and we’re actually friends,_ he wanted to tell Liam, but he didn’t. 

Liam hesitated outside the car, hovering at the edge of the lawn. “This is your house?” he said.

“Usually there’s more people here,” Zayn explained. “My family, when they’re in the states. My cousins stay over a lot. It’s not this big for just me. And it’s all run by green energy, like. It’s pretty cool.”

“Pretty cool,” Liam echoed. “Yeah, it is.” 

“We going in?” Zayn said, venturing a little smile.

Liam seemed startled. “Yeah, yeah.”

The alarm system beeped as they came in, echoing in the empty hall. Liam stared up and around, taking it in. Zayn watched him nervously out the corner of his eye, hoping he wasn’t like, cataloging all the ways Zayn was a gross corporate stooge or something. 

But then they came into the living room, and the view was spread out before them, framed by the glowing neon line of the pool at the base of the deck. The view was something that never stopped feeling good. The sloping mountains, the scattered pockets of light glowing in the foothills, the deep velvet reservoir. Beyond the hills glimmered the city, spilled out like a golden sea. 

Liam said softly, “Holy _shit._ ” 

“Do you want a drink or something?” Zayn asked, flicking on the lights. “I mean, um, juice or something?” He wasn’t sure he had any juice.

“Holy shit,” Liam said again. The sweet, slow smile was spreading over his face. He crossed the living room, trailing a wondering hand over the grand piano, and moved to the huge windows. His palms hovered an inch away from the glass like he was nervous of smudging it. 

“It’s okay,” Zayn said, opening the fridge and grabbing a bottle of water. He reached for a beer for himself, hesitated, then took another water instead. “You can press your nose up on it, I do.”

“Can I go outside?” Liam asked.

“Yeah, of course,” Zayn said. “It’s a sliding door -- no, yeah, that side. Just pull the -- there you go.”

Liam stepped out onto the deck. For a second he was a dark cutout against the jeweled view, lonely and almost magical looking, like an album cover. Then he turned back. The light spilling from the window lit him up: his whole face was crinkled up with infectious joy, his eyes curved up, his kid’s smile enormous. “Holy shit!” he said.

“Yeah, it’s all right,” Zayn said, grinning back as he stepped out next to him. He handed Liam a water bottle and opened his own.

“This is unbelievable. Bet you can see the stars and everything, can’t you? When the lights are off?”

“Yeah,” Zayn said. “Usually keep the lights on, though. I’m not, like, proper outdoorsy.”

“Outdoorsy?” Liam said, lifting a teasing eyebrow at him. “Is that what that word means to you? Turning the lights off now and then while you sit in your own pool?”

Zayn ducked his head, feeling himself blush. “You know what I mean,” he said. He glanced sideways at Liam. “There’s hiking around here, but I’m not -- you’re probably into proper camping and all that stuff, aren’t you? Like you know what different kinds of knots are.”

“I’ve never heard anyone say the word ‘camping’ like that,” Liam said. “Like you were saying ‘tetanus.’ You’d like it too if you ever went, I bet. I’ll take you some time.” He crouched and dipped his hand in the pool, stirring the water so light broke in the ripples. “This place is gorgeous. I never really got why people would live up here, but I can see it now.”

“Do you want like, the tour?”

“Absolutely, yeah. Do you mind if we just, like, sit out here for a sec though? I can’t believe this view, and just -- it feels good to be out in the air.”

Absurdly Zayn felt proud, like he’d made the valley and the mountains and the lake and even the shimmering dream of the city. Like they were all a gift for Liam. “Yeah, of course,” he said. 

He kicked off his shoes and sat down on the deck, dangling his feet in the water, and after a second Liam did too. His legs and ankles were skinny, pale underwater. There was a screw tattooed on his left ankle. Zayn wished he were a little more buzzed, a little less nervous. He thought longingly of the baggie upstairs.

“All right if I smoke?” he said, already reaching into his jacket.

“Go ahead. Can I bum one?”

It was embarrassing how much his heart leapt at that, like it meant something. Silently he tapped a cigarette out and passed it over. Liam leaned in to Zayn’s lighter, his cheeks hollowed in the flare of it. His fingers brushed the back of Zayn’s cupped hand.

Rolo had ventured out onto the deck, looking superior. “Oh, hello,” Liam said, holding out his hand. “Aren’t you friendly?”

“She’s a little fucking opportunist,” Zayn said through his cigarette. “Thinks you’ve got snacks.”

“I’m a dog person usually, I’m afraid,” Liam said. He was scratching gently under Rolo’s chin, his big hand flattening her ear: she pushed into it, purring. “But you’re a sweetheart.”

“What’s your dog’s name again?”

“Loki. Neighbor’s taking him out tonight.”

“I’d love a dog,” Zayn said. “Only I can’t get one right now, like -- I never know what my schedule’s gonna be, and I wouldn’t want to just hand a puppy off to like a caretaker, you know? Rolo here can take care of herself.” Rolo gave him a slightly reproachful look with one open eye, like, _How would you know?_

“Rolo,” Liam said. He had such a nice voice. That deep murmur with the amused warmth in it, the hint of Brummie. “That’s nice. Suits you. Roly-poly.”

“Are you calling my cat fat?”

“She is very fat and very beautiful,” Liam said, scratching down Rolo’s spine as the cat arched ecstatically. “Didn’t you say your family stays here?”

“Yeah, a bit. When they’re in the States.”

“Where are they the rest of the time?”

“Um. Bradford, like? My mum and dad and sisters.” 

“No way. I’m from Wolverhampton. You’re a Northern boy, too?”

“Innit,” Zayn said. Liam grinned at him. 

“Eh oop,” he said.

“Eh oop,” Zayn echoed. He was pretty sure his face was doing something foolish, something helpless and fond. He looked away from Liam, back out at the sparkling view.

“How’d you end up in California, then?” Liam was asking.

“How’d you?” Zayn countered. “My turn for questions.”

Liam nodded like that was reasonable. “Came out with Louis,” he said. He’d put out his half-smoked cigarette in the ashtray by the chaise, and his fingers still moved idly in Rolo’s scruff. “We were in a band together when we were teenagers, got signed when I was -- must’ve been seventeen. Came out here for that, and because I fancied moving anyway, but in the end we didn’t want to do the same music and I left the band. And then it was maybe a year after that I got sober, so it was a whole -- we weren’t on good terms for a while. Closer than ever in the end, obviously, but it’s pure luck we didn’t murder each other.” 

_Obviously._ What the hell did that mean, _obviously?_ Were they dating or weren’t they? “How long have you and Louis, um --” His courage failed him. He said weakly, “How long have you known each other?”

“Oh God, ages,” Liam said, leaning back on his hands. In the blue light reflecting from the pool his face looked clear and young. “We grew up together, and Lou was this local legend. I was a bit -- I had some trouble at school, and he sort of took me under his wing. He had this band called the Fuck Holes, believe it or not. They used to play these awful dives, and he always got me in. I wasn’t but fourteen, fifteen. He was a madman.” He glanced sideways at Zayn, that private smile in his eyes. "I bet you were really cool when you were a teenager, weren’t you? Leather jackets and -- and Tribe Called Quest on vinyl.”

“Not exactly,” Zayn said. 

“Were you here, or in Bradford?”

“Here. Moved when I was twelve. For the, uh, career.” The word was embarrassing: he tried a jokey drawl on it, but wasn’t sure if it landed. “You know. Opportunities and that. Mum hated it, but in the end she let me because it was like -- following my dreams, or whatever.”

There was a pause. Liam stirred his feet in the water, a peaceful little washing sound. Zayn went on suddenly, “It was weird. It was like this one year where I was really ambitious. Before I’d always been a bit dreamy. Thought I was something special, but I was just sort of waiting for it to happen. And then it was like I suddenly woke up and thought, _Well, it’s not gonna just fall on top of me._ I was almost panicked, like, really desperate. I kept thinking, _If I don’t go, I’ll -- nothing will ever happen, I’ll never meet the right people, I’ll sleep through the right moment._ Whatever. So. And I had some family here, so I came out and stayed with my aunt and uncle.”

“ _She said you’re movin’ with your auntie and uncle in Bel Air,_ ” Liam said, sing-song. 

“Yeah, well, except it was Anaheim.”

“The Fresh Prince of Anaheim,” Liam said. “I can see it. Less glamour, more...what have they got in Anaheim?”

“Not much. I mean, Disneyland. I didn’t go but twice. I was always rehearsing.”

“Rehearsing? Like, for school stuff?”

“Nah. Actually I was, um, in this band? Sort of a boy band thing.”

“No way,” Liam said. “You were in a boy band?”

“I was,” Zayn said. It was strange to remember that that poor kid had been him: stiff and awkward, posing with his arms crossed really tight and his mouth pouted up. Wearing a pukka shell necklace, for God’s sake. “We were meant to be the next B2K, but it didn’t really work out. Played a lot of shopping malls. Midday gigs. Turned out it was all a bit of a scam, really, the manager was -- well, it doesn’t matter.”

“Was what?” Liam said, neutral.

“Not that,” Zayn said hastily. “Not what you’re thinking, like, Lou Pearlman stuff. He basically pocketed a bunch of what was supposed to be our money, is all. There was a lawsuit, it was really boring.”

“Oh, okay, he just stole a bunch of your money,” Liam said. “Kids in this industry -- it’s a fucking --” He made a quick, eloquent, cut-off gesture. “Anyway, sorry.”

“Well, just, it meant I wasn’t in school much. Ended up with my GED, and I actually met my agent through it, so it was all right. But anyway, I didn’t know a lot of people. Didn’t have that many friends.”

“Neither did I,” Liam said. “I was -- it was really just me and Louis and these, like, anarcho-feminist girls I played music with. Mostly I was just really unhappy. And drinking all the time, and reading too many books.” Liam’s voice was light, and he pulled a little smile like he was just joking, but Zayn had to fight the urge to touch him, to reassure him. Just his knee or his shoulder. If he’d been sat a little closer.

“I would have thought you were cool,” Zayn said, and then stared fixedly out into the night so Liam wouldn’t see how his face had heated up.

Liam nudged Zayn’s bare foot under the water. “I would have thought you were, too,” he said.

Zayn’s phone buzzed suddenly in his discarded jacket. He fumbled for it: it was Frank. “Hang on, sorry,” he said.

“No, go, go,” Liam said.

“Heya, babe,” Zayn said. He blew out a long plume of smoke.

“Fuckin animals,” Frank said. “I saw the video. You okay?”

“Was okay this morning, still okay,” Zayn said. He rolled his eyes at Liam. Liam smiled, looked away.

“Yeah, but it wasn’t like that this morning. Did that one guy hit you?”

“Barely. He like, grazed me by accident.”

“How’s Liam Payne? He okay?”

“Yeah, he’s here now. Came back to the house. Wanna say hi?” He covered the mouthpiece. “Frank says hi,” he told Liam. Liam fell back a little, pretending to swoon.

“What did you say to them?”

“Nothing, I didn’t say anything.”

Frank was quiet for a second. “Sorry this is happening, babe,” he said.

The endearment caught Zayn off guard. “It’s all right,” he said.

“Not really,” Frank said. He sighed. “Anyway, I just wanted to check in. Glad you’re okay. We should probably like, talk something out about it, eventually. Like, what to say.”

“Or we could just say nothing because it’s nobody’s damn business,” Zayn said. Liam was studying his hands. _Sorry,_ Zayn mouthed at him, and Liam shook his head a little.

“Okay, or we could do that,” Frank said. “Come by -- uh, not tomorrow -- maybe Sunday? Just to chill, talk it out.”

“Yeah, all right,” Zayn said, to get rid of him. 

“Love you, bro. Take care of yourself.”

“Love you too.” He disconnected and dropped the phone back onto his piled up jacket. “Sorry. What were we talking about?”

“Um, I don’t remember,” Liam said. He scrubbed a hand over the back of his close-cropped head. “Listen, you wanna give me that tour in the morning? I’m beat, man.” 

“Yeah, of course,” Zayn said. He clambered to his feet and bent to help Liam up. Liam barely seemed to use the assist, just grasped his hand and stood on his own. His grip didn’t linger: he dried his hands on his rolled-up jeans, glancing out at the reservoir one last time, and then blew out a quick, wondering breath of laughter.

“Unreal,” he said.

Zayn left him with a pile of clothes and a spare toothbrush in the biggest guest bedroom, the upstairs one with the reservoir view and Zayn’s own old flatscreen. “Um, thanks for staying,” Zayn said, hovering a little awkwardly.

“No, man, thank you,” Liam said. 

“If you want anything from the fridge or anything -- you know -- help yourself. I’m down the hall if you can’t find it.”

“Okay,” Liam said. “Goodnight.” They watched each other for a weird second: then Liam sort of half-smiled. There was something wistful in it.

“Night,” he said again, and shut the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [This is Zayn's house,](http://www.sothebyshomes.com/Los-Angeles-Real-Estate/sales/0027172) if ur curious. ps can you guys believe [Frank Ocean/Zayn is totally real now???](http://www.buzzfeed.com/sydneyscott/zayn-malik-is-working-with-frank-oceans-producer-malay#.goVO7v7nG), God, what a time to be alive.


End file.
